Conventional light managing systems for automotive vehicle headlights, sidelights and taillights typically include a bulb filament recessed in a reflector housing behind a cover lens. The light emitted from the bulb filament is reflected from the reflector housing outwardly through the cover lens to form a beam or planar light image. The cover lens shapes the light into the desired pattern, i.e., focused headlight beam or pattern side or rear signal. However, conventional bulb and reflector lighting systems are disadvantageous in terms of styling and size flexibility. The bulb and reflector require a significant depth and width to acquire desired focus and light dispersion through the cover lens, thus, limiting the ability to streamline and contour the light system.
Other systems have been developed to provide alternatives to the conventional bulb filament and reflector system utilizing a light pipe and collimator to direct the light to a reflective emitter having a plurality of lens facets to redirect the light in the desired path and pattern. These systems are exemplified in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,434,754 to Li et al., issued Jul. 18, 1995 and 5,197,792 to Jiao et al., issued Mar. 30, 1993.
However, there is still a need for an efficient, thin light managing system which provides the flexibility of coupling a variety of light emitting arrangements for both direct lighting and redirected lighting by combining the use of direct lensing and light pipe optics having redirecting facets to achieve a desired light distribution and pattern.